Skip to main content

The Desert

After leaving British Columbia in early March, we headed for the desert southwest.  It was still snowing in BC and hard to pull ourselves away, but the desert was calling and we were ready to go.  


The southwestern US is truly one of the greatest places on earth.  There is an abundance of canyons, rivers, mountains, wildlife, starry nights, national parks, friendly people and wide open spaces.  We went from one protected space to another and we were stunned by the beauty and remoteness the entire time.  If you have not been, put it on your list.  It is not to be missed. 

While in the desert, we mountain biked, canyoneered, hiked, paddled and soaked in the warmth.  Again we were so fortunate to have great friends join us for a variety of adventures.  Thank you to all who made this so fun! A special shout out to Tom and Ashley who provided list after list of great places to recreate and some of the necessary gear to do so.  Below are some photos from our 4 week stint.  

The riding is ALL TIME...


We could not totally escape the snow!
Nor could we keep our feet dry!

Nearing the top of Fern's Nipple
Island in the Sky lives up to its name
Some of our hikes were mellow...
.... and some less so
Greg wanted to roost up this, but we ran out of time. Maybe next year.
We learned to become one with the mud....
    ... because there was no escape
It is always fun to pull out our packrafts.... 
...even when water is limited
Scrabble comes with us everywhere
So beautiful....
Our last day! 
And so ends an unbelievable trip.  We will be back again next year.  There is still so much more to do.  Thanks for following our travels.  I am excited to reunite with family and friends in the northeast, and clean out the dust and mud in RED.



Comments

  1. UnknownApril 8, 2022 at 7:53 AM

    thanks for taking us along with you. crazy beautiful places.

    ReplyDelete

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Jumbo Hut

  Continued greetings from British Columbia! The snow is still falling and the powder is still deep. We recently left to comforts of RED to go to a backcountry hut at Jumbo Pass.  It is located in the Purcell mountain range, just south of the Bugaboos. This area was recently saved from the persistent efforts of the commercial ski industry who wanted to build a mega resort in this pristine wilderness.  Thanks to the efforts of many groups, this area will be preserved in its natural state forever.  To read more and see this area click here, Keep Jumbo Wild .   This will give you a sense of the beauty and the importance of keeping it wild. Getting to the hut involves about an hour snowmobile and then a 2500 foot climb to the cabin. The access was a bit of a challenge as 3 out of 5 of us had to tow/ski behind the snowmobile on a narrow logging road with many obstacles along the way.  I was fortunate ride the snowmobile both ways.  Watching the guys get towed behind was like watching a bad
6 comments
Read more

Road Trip

  We made it to BC! January 17th: The day before our big departure, we got our covid PCR tests, which are needed to enter Canada. The results were valid for 72 hours so we had our work cut out for us to get across the border within this time frame. The clock was ticking…. Ready, Set, Go! January 18th : 5:00 am we hit the road - photo of Greg below who was so psyched!  You can’t tell but he already has his ski boots on.  We drove 17  hours, then hit a truck stop to sleep a bit.  We were somewhere in Minnesota.  The hum of the diesel engines was good white noise.   January 19th:  Windy day makes for jostling van.  Sue tired.  Greg not impacted in the slightest.   January 20th: 3 days, 3 Wordle games, 8 PB&Js, and 12 fuel stops later, we cross the Canadian border with just minutes to spare.  Phew.  I am not experiencing the relaxing part of retirement just yet. Let the skiing begin! We met our friends Tom, Jeanie and Jonny for 4 days of skiing (or what I would call "hard marching
8 comments
Read more

Chasing Snow Again

Here we are, at it again, going wherever the snow and weather takes us. This time feeling like van veterans. View from our window as we drove into British Columbia Some key takeaways from last year: Pack less clothes, 2 of everything is enough except underwear Everyone wants to talk about van batteries Tea with honey is a must on backcountry ski days Drying gear in a small space is an art and a skill You can make a turkey dinner on one burner If you want to get away from people, just keep driving north We left Lyme, NH on New Year's Eve. What better way (for us) to spend New Year's Eve; no champagne, no big parties, no ball dropping.  We just had the wide open road in front of us and some good pod casting, snacking, and truck stopping.  Forty three hours later we were in British Columbia, our treasured winter paradise.  We started in the town of Nelson, where we spent a few days getting back into the groove again.   After this, we had the good fortune of staying in two backcoun
1 comment
Read more